Highwoods Properties buys Monarch Centre for $332 per square foot

Raleigh-based real estate Investment trust Highwoods Properties Inc. completed the purchase of Buckhead’s Monarch Centre in late September for $297.5 million, or $332 per square foot and has also invested $5.4 million in planned capital improvements to the 1980s project.

The nearly 900,000-square-foot office project includes Monarch Tower (built in 1997) and Monarch Plaza, an older tower finished in 1983.

Highwoods now owns 1.9 million square feet in Buckhead, including Monarch Centre and two adjacent towers, One and Two Alliance Center.

A partnership of New York State Teachers Retirement System and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority hired Eastdil Secured earlier this summer to market Monarch Centre.

Monarch Centre joins several other Buckhead properties that traded hands over the past 14 months for greater than $300 a foot, including 3630 Peachtree ($390 per foot); The Pinnacle ($356 per foot); and One Buckhead Plaza ($340 per foot), according to market data.

Two Buckhead Plaza, a building on Peachtree Road in the Buckhead Village, is also expected to sell for over $350 per foot, according to the Atlanta Business Chronicle.

Outside of south Florida, Buckhead is producing the most recent office transactions in the Southeast of at least $300 a foot, according to Colliers International.